This past weekend saw us planting our flag on another rooftop in midtown – next door to a church, no less! But as Robert Frost wrote, “Good fences make good neighbors,” and there was a very fine fence here, providing enough of a margin of privacy to make us feel comfortable going fully nude rather than just topless. What a marvelous afternoon! Miniature cupcakes, coconut water, 70SPF sunblock, and books ranging from Toni Morrison and Sylvia Plath to David Dodge and Richard Stark.

We’ll have a full report for you shortly – but to whet your appetite, here’s a brief selection of poems penned in the heat of the moment (or the moment of the heat, if you prefer), together with the images that inspired them.

Urban oasis A beach upon a rooftop Haiku for bare breasts

The sun beats down upon my headI think that I shall tan insteadMy dorsal side, so pale of cheek,While reading tales sublimely bleak

Of heists and murders, crosses double,Lives reduced to smoking rubbleBy a femme fatale so fatalThat the fate of her poor mate’ll

Chill your blood and leave you shivering…Just the thing a book’s deliveringOn a blistering August dayWill work to whisk the heat away

Put the camera in the hands of a guyAnd the picture lines up with his flyYes, we could’ve cropped it Or Photoshopped itBut it’s funnier this way, don’t lie

ETA: Just got this contribution from a follower of our blog who asked to remain anonymous…

While reading through wordpress I happened to seeA couple of blog posts appealing to me.They didn’t have cat pictures, nor were they news,But the people they featured had books and tattoos.

You all show a courage I wish I possessedWhen you go out and read books in public, undressed,And I wish you the best, for wherever you read–Your pulp fiction brings class to a city in need.

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It’s certainly nice to see some courageous free spirits out there enjoying the sun and wind. It’s yours, take it and keep it. I applaud your efforts on many levels, oddly, sexuality is not at the top of the list. Must be my daughter’s influence, or years of teaching young ladies in middle school. Rod

While I can appreciate the freedom of complete nudity (and prefer it myself) I must say that hiding behind a fence does little to forward the cause and gain numbers. Would love to see the group swell to hundreds or thousands gathering at a park, beach, festival, etc. As a matter of fact, taking your group to a larger function once in awhile might be the best bet to gain numbers.

No argument – when we meet on a rooftop it doesn’t further the cause. But it’s fun! And sometimes you just want to have fun. If for every five or six or seven public events where we forward the cause we have one just for fun on a rooftop, I hope you won’t begrudge us.

And for now at least, if we want to get naked all the way, we can’t do it in a park.

Here in San Francisco we have at least 3 nude beaches; plus a small cadre–less than 10–naked guys hang around Castro Street, plus one of the city parks will often feature public nudity. The question of public nudity is to the chagrin of most residents–children seeing things that best not be seen and what not. So a fence seems prudent…

Honestly, Steven, I don’t think children mind at all – a little boy or girl seeing a pair of breasts will think nothing of it, or even a penis or vagina. It’s their parents who have concerns, not the children. If adults could just regain a small fraction of the innocence they had as children, we could all be naked any time we wanted, without thinking in terms of “things that best not be seen.” But as that’s not the world we live in, yes, a fence is prudent.

Martin: this is a switch. We in America think that Pilgrim / Victorian ethos controls our world view. Whilst we assume in Europe, public nudity at the beach is de rigueur. The Riviera, Cape d’Agde, even a public park in Berlin devoted to public nudity. But here in the States, there are many venues for public nudity at several beaches, all well documented. What’s nice about San Francisco’s nude beach is that it is easily accessible. San Francisco is a small city–800,000–a seven mile by seven mile peninsula into the ocean. So unlike New York City where a person has to travel to Jones Beach or Fire Island or even Jacob Riise, here in San Francisco is a moderately short trip either by car or by public transit bus. (Course, be forwarned. The beach is located near the Golden Gate Bridge and the weather in July and August can be fog bound, cold and windy. Best times are early spring, and September, October.) Oh, kudos to the writer of the poem: “The sun beats down upon my head…”

I’ve never seen nude or topless sunbathing in Golden Gate Park unless it’s during Bay to Breakers. Folsom Street Fair offers a public venue for public nudity and fetish wear–then it could be quite a large crowd…

I just found your blog and I’m surprised how open and apparently tolerant your society is in some regions of the US. I’m from Europe and for me and what I read about it, it always seemed as if it’s not possible. Here in Europe we also have areas were you can be nude to just enjoy life. I myself do it sometimes in special areas were it is alowed. But unfortunately until now I have not found friends to do it together. I think you have something very valuable and you’re a crowd of some very special people. Keep it! And go on! Greetings from Europe.

I really respect what you’re doing here, because I think it gives people a chance to question the validity of all these ideas we have in this country concerning what is acceptable and not acceptable in public. I am American and I live in Manhattan, but I’ve spent a lot of time in Europe, and it seems that people there are much less constrained by traditional ideas of what is right and wrong and feel more free to express themselves. What your doing is beautiful, aside from the obvious physical beauty, because it shows people the true human potential that can be discovered when one does not adhere to traditional values of acceptabilty and follows the heart. I give you my full support and hope you continue this blog, it gives me hope for the future of the human race, or at least for the future of New York. 🙂 Of course, I’m also always secretly hoping that I’ll stumble upon your group during my wanderings in Central Park, but such has not been my fortune so far.